


Sunrise Over Insomnia

by Sauronix



Series: The Lights of Lestallum [3]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst, Barebacking, Bottom Gladio, Canon Disabled Character, Canonical Character Death, Fluff, Getting Back Together, Happy Ending, Love, M/M, Makeup Sex, Oral Sex, Post-Game, Table Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-01
Updated: 2017-09-01
Packaged: 2018-12-22 15:21:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11970147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sauronix/pseuds/Sauronix
Summary: “I made a huge mistake,” Gladio says.Ignis frowns at him. “A mistake?”“I wanna be with you.”Ignis sighs and sets his fork down. “Gladio—”“Wait, hear me out.” Gladio reaches for his wine glass and takes a huge gulp. Hell, he’s gonna need it. “I know I don’t have any right to ask for a second chance. But I have to. I wish I’d never left that night. Wish I’d answered your phone calls.” Across from him, Ignis’s face is carefully blank of expression. “Fuck, Iggy, I miss you.”After six years of separation, and after they've saved the world, Gladio finds his way back into Ignis's arms. Set after "The Lights of Lestallum" and "The Darkest Nights."





	Sunrise Over Insomnia

Gladio always thought failing in his only duty would be hard. But it isn’t. When it happens, it’s as easy as taking one last gasp of air and slipping beneath the waves.  
  
And the distraction just makes it easier. With the iron giants coming at him, he can’t think about anything but survival. They keep him so busy that he doesn’t even notice Noct’s last, lonely walk up the Citadel steps. Maybe that’s for the best. Gladio doesn’t think he could’ve watched him go.  
  
So they fight, the three of them, while Noct goes to his death. Gladio trains one eye on the daemons and the other on Ignis, tracking the fluid movements of his body—his dancer’s grace, his assassin’s instincts. Ignis keeps his distance, springing out of harm’s way when he needs to, like he can sense the shift in the air as the iron giant swings its sword. His daggers leave his hands with a sniper’s precision.  
  
He doesn’t need Gladio’s help. He doesn’t need anyone’s help. Why the hell did it take Gladio so long to see that?  
  
When dawn breaks, it takes Gladio a few seconds to realize what it means. But Ignis knows right away. As the iron giants melt back into the ground and the weapons dissolve in their hands, he screams Noct’s name like his guts are being ripped right out of his body. Before anyone can stop him, he’s scrambling up the Citadel stairs.  
  
“Ignis!” Prompto shouts. “Stop! It’s too dangerous!”  
  
But Ignis doesn’t listen. Even when he slips on the slick flagstone, it hardly slows him down. He just crawls to his feet and keeps going. Gladio and Prompto chase him into the Citadel’s silent halls, up the elevator, and into the throne room.  
  
He isn’t ready for what they find—Noct, slumped over on his throne, pinned by a massive blade, his glassy eyes gazing at nothing. For once, he’s glad Ignis can’t see, if only to spare him this. But somehow, Ignis still knows. It’s like there’s an invisible thread connecting him to Noct that even death can’t sever. Gladio just watches numbly as Ignis drops to his knees, his cheek wet with tears, and rests his head against Noct’s leg.  
  
They have to drag Ignis away from his corpse, forcefully uncurling his fingers from Noct’s pant leg, and when his legs give out, they have to hold him upright. He trembles in their arms like he’s having a fucking seizure. Somewhere in the back of Gladio’s stunned brain, it occurs to him that it’s the first time he’s touched Ignis in six years. But Ignis is so lost in shock and grief that he probably doesn’t even realize it. He just cries without sound, his face pressed to Gladio’s shoulder.  
  
In the end, Prompto escorts him from the room so Gladio can deal with Noct’s body. There’s nowhere to bury him. Nowhere to burn him. Nowhere to deliver him to a watery grave. But he can’t just leave him to rot on the throne. The last King of Lucis deserves a hell of a lot better than that.  
  
It takes him a few tugs, but he finally gets the blade free, cradling Noct when he falls forward into Gladio’s arms.  
  
_Astrals._  
  
Without life to buoy it, Noct’s body feels like a ton of bricks. His head rests on Gladio’s shoulder with the weight of a bowling ball. That’s when it finally hits him—that the boy he carried back to the Regalia when he was poisoned during a hunt, the boy who _argued_ with him the whole damn way, is gone.  
  
He’s gone.  
  
Blinking back his tears, Gladio lays him out on the floor, taking care to fold his arms over his belly. He pulls a tattered red banner down from the wall and spreads it over him, looking down into Noct’s face. Those half-lidded eyes gaze back at him, black and unseeing. Maybe accusing. If Gladio had only done his job right, if only he hadn’t been so fucking powerless, maybe Noct would still be here. Maybe Noct—  
  
No.  
  
Noct would say this was his fate, and that only his death could have stopped the Starscourge.  
  
_Someone help me. Someone please fucking help me._  
  
A choked sob bursts out of him, and he bends to kiss Noct’s forehead with wet, quivering lips.  
  
It takes him a good two hours to build the cairn. Two hours of gathering rubble from the Citadel floor and arranging the broken stones around Noct’s corpse, carefully, so he doesn’t crush him. The work keeps him busy enough that there’s no time to mourn. He thinks only of piling one stone on top of the other, over and over. By the time he’s done, he’s panting, sweat soaking through his t-shirt. He’s long since shed his Kingsglaive coat.  
  
He looks at his handiwork, at Noct’s final resting place, illuminated in the rays of sunlight that spear through the hole in the ceiling. It ain’t much to look at. It’s not a gilded tomb fit to mark the passing of a king. But it’s probably enough for Noct. Shit, it’ll have to be.  
  
Gladio kisses his fingertips and touches them to the top of the cairn. His job here is done.

  
*

  
Ignis cries quietly all the way back to Hammerhead. He never makes a sound; only the shaking of his shoulders and his stumbling gait give him away. Prompto keeps an arm around him, guiding him, murmuring soothing nothings that Gladio can’t hear.  
  
Did Ignis cry like that the night Gladio left?  
  
He feels like a selfish asshole for even thinking it.  
  
Somehow, they make it back to Hammerhead. They stay there for three nights, letting Cindy fuss over them as they wrestle with their grief. At the end of each day, Gladio sits alone on the roof of the Crow’s Nest and watches the sunset. The others never join him. It’s easier that way. He doesn’t know what the hell to say, and neither do they. They’re all too busy figuring out who they’re supposed to be without Noct to give them a purpose.  
  
He’s not Gladiolus Amicitia, Shield of the King, anymore. He’s just Gladiolus Amicitia, a nobody. His life is his own to live now.  
  
It scares the shit out of him.

  
*

  
When Gladio tells them he’s heading back to Lestallum, Ignis asks if he can join him for the ride.  
  
“You sure?” Gladio asks.  
  
Ignis just gives him that maddening half-smile. “Well, I can’t exactly drive myself, can I?”  
  
Yeah, there’s no arguing with that one. Not that he wants to. Spending four hours alone with Ignis in the front seat of Dave’s shitty pickup truck? There’s nothing else he’d rather do.  
  
He debates whether they should wait for morning to leave, but there’s no point in putting it off any further. Neither of them has much to pack, and being in Hammerhead’s just souring the few happy memories they have left. So Gladio zips his Kingsglaive uniform into his duffel bag and tosses it into the bed of the truck, fills his water bottle from the tap at the Crow’s Nest, and sits at the window while Ignis finishes packing his own things.  
  
Prompto leans on the counter next to him. “I’m really gonna miss you, big guy.”  
  
“I’ll still be around.”  
  
“Yeah. Maybe.” Prompto drums his fingers on the countertop, avoiding Gladio’s gaze. “We won’t have much of an excuse to see each other, now that there are no daemons to hunt.”  
  
“You’ve got my number. You can call anytime.”  
  
But he knows Prompto won’t. It’s weird, to think they might never see each other again—that without Noct to hold them together, they’ll go their separate ways, fall out of touch, become nothing more than strangers to one another.  
  
Ten years ago, he never would’ve thought it possible. He remembers the nights they spent crammed together in the tent, fighting for space to put their sleeping bags, and the long, sun-soaked days goofing off in the Regalia. He remembers fishing contests with Noct. Posing for cheesy photos with Prompto. Sharing a pot of coffee and a comfortable silence with Ignis in the glow of the campfire.  
  
Those days are long gone.  
  
He swallows the lump in his throat. “Hey, Prompto. Can I have one of your photos?”  
  
“Don’t see why not.” Prompto vaults over the counter, opens a cupboard, and returns with a small metal box, which he hands to Gladio. “Take as many as you want. I can always print more.”  
  
Gladio glances out the window, double-checking that Ignis is still in the caravan, before he flips through them. He takes a shot of the four of them grinning on the beach at Galdin Quay, stripped down to their swimsuits, beads of water glistening on their skin in the sunlight. They all look so young. And they acted it, too. He’ll never forget that day. Noct and Prompto helped some kids build a sandcastle, and Ignis fried up a fish at their campsite, making idle conversation as Gladio pitched the tent.  
  
Next, he grabs a candid of Noct laughing by the campfire. Just looking at his smiling face, at his bright, lively eyes, makes it hard to breathe.  
  
Then he pauses over one of Ignis, lifting it carefully from the box. It’s a recent one. Gladio can tell because he’s got his hair styled back in a pompadour. He’s not wearing his shades, and his blind eye gazes at something just to the left of the camera, that unknowable smile curving his lips. He’s sitting at the counter at the Crow’s Nest here in Hammerhead with a cup of coffee in his hand. Gladio traces a thumb over Ignis’s face in the photograph, wishing he could touch the real thing.  
  
That one, he tucks into the breast pocket of his jacket, just over his heart.  
  
He glances up at Prompto and finds him looking back, one eyebrow raised. But he doesn’t say anything. He only nods and closes the lid of the box.  
  
When Ignis finally emerges from the caravan, he’s wearing a navy blue button-down and black suspenders. Talcott’s with him, one hand in the small of his back to guide him, the other carrying his bag. Gladio watches as they approach, his eyes straying to the cling of Ignis’s shirt on his athlete’s body.  
  
The bell over the door jingles as they enter, and Gladio rises from his stool to meet them. “Hey. You ready to hit the road?” he asks.  
  
Ignis nods. “Let’s not waste any more time. Talcott, thank you for your assistance.”  
  
“No problem.” Talcott hands Ignis’s bag to Gladio. “I have to help Cindy with a few things here before I head back to Lestallum. I’ll drop by your apartment when I get back.”  
  
“Of course,” Ignis says. “Take care.”  
  
Talcott goes, and then it’s just the three of them. None of them speak. They all share a loss, but they still can’t share the grief. _I miss him_ , Gladio wants to say. _And now that he’s gone, I don’t know what to do._  
  
“I’ll see you guys around,” Prompto finally says. He pulls Ignis into a stiff hug, then claps Gladio on the back. “Like I said, keep in touch, big guy. Don’t be a stranger.”  
  
“Yeah. If you’re ever in Lestallum, give me a shout,” Gladio says. He slings both bags over his shoulder and holds the door open for Ignis, letting him out into the twilight. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t.”

  
*

  
Ignis says nothing as the pickup sputters down the highway. He stares out the windshield like a fucking statue, barely flinching when Gladio lays on the horn at a cargo van that pulls out in front of them without warning. It’s not like he doesn’t get it. Because he does. He hurt Ignis, and Ignis doesn’t owe him anything, least of all small talk. But it’s four hours to Lestallum. They can’t just sit here in awkward silence the whole gods-damned way.  
  
“You doing okay?” he asks when he can’t take it anymore.  
  
“As well as can be,” Ignis responds.  
  
Gladio glances at him, and sweet Shiva, he has to stop himself from putting a hand on Ignis’s thigh. He used to do it with Liv, back in the early days of their relationship, but it would feel more natural to do it with Ignis. More right. “You thought at all about what you’re gonna do now?”  
  
“I haven’t,” Ignis says. “I’m still trying to process it all.”  
  
“Yeah. Me too.” They lapse into silence again. Gladio scratches the back of his neck. He’s always been the guy who knows what to say, no matter the situation, but now he can’t think of anything. At least nothing that won’t make him sound like an asshole. “I guess someone has to rebuild Insomnia. New government and all that. You probably know more about Lucian politics than anyone still standing.”  
  
“Perhaps.”  
  
“Are you…” Gladio licks his lips. He’s dying to ask, but he’s not sure he’ll like the answer. “Are you gonna stay in Lestallum?”  
  
“As I said, Gladio, I don’t know what I’m going to do. There aren’t many ways for a blind man to make a living in this world. I suppose working for our new government, whatever form it might take, is the most logical course of action.”  
  
His stomach curdles at the thought of Ignis leaving Lestallum. It shouldn’t. They’ve been living in the same city for the past six years, and they’ve only crossed paths once or twice. It doesn’t matter whether Ignis is in Lestallum or Insomnia.  
  
Gladio probably won’t be seeing him either way.  
  
“You given any more thought to opening a restaurant?” he asks. “You don’t really need your sight to do that. I bet Iris’d help you out.”  
  
Ignis shifts in his seat. “I don’t know that my cooking is good enough to sustain a business.”  
  
“Bullshit. You’re the best cook I know.”  
  
“And what about you, Gladio?” There’s an edge to Ignis’s voice now. “Tell me, since we’re interrogating each other—what will you do with your life? I daresay you’ll marry that woman you’ve been living with? Raise a family?”  
  
Shit. He’s pissed. At least, as pissed as Ignis ever gets. “I haven’t asked her yet,” Gladio says quietly.  
  
They don’t speak again until they reach Lestallum.  
  
Gladio pulls up in front of Ignis’s apartment—the one above the junk shop, where they lived together all those years ago—and kills the engine. They sit in silence for a minute. There’s a lot Gladio still wants to say. _I’m sorry_ is definitely at the top of the list. _I still want you_ is up there, too. Shiva’s tits, it would be so fucking easy to reach over and cup the back of his neck, to draw him into a kiss, to show Ignis what he feels.  
  
But he isn’t brave enough.  
  
Instead, he says, “Do you need help getting upstairs?”  
  
“No, thank you.” Ignis opens the door and steps out. “If you’d be so good as to pass me my bag? I don’t want to take yours by mistake.”  
  
Sighing, Gladio gets out of the truck and grabs Ignis’s grey duffel from the bed. When Ignis steps up onto the sidewalk and holds out his hand, he gives it over, his mind racing. _Say something_ , he thinks. _Don’t let him go without telling him you miss him_.  
  
“Am I gonna see you again?” he asks.  
  
Ignis turns his key in the lock and opens the door. “I don’t imagine you will,” he says.  
  
And he closes the door in Gladio’s face.

  
*

  
When he’s home, after Liv’s finished raining kisses on his face and he’s unpacked the few things he brought back with him from Hammerhead, he sticks the photos Prompto gave him on the fridge. He’s drinking milk from the carton and staring at them, his heart still stinging from Ignis’s parting words, when Liv comes up beside him, slipping an arm around his waist.  
  
“Who are they?” she asks.  
  
“Friends,” he says.  
  
She laughs and squeezes him, pressing a kiss to his shoulder. “Yeah, I figured that out already, silly. What are their names?”  
  
“The one with black hair is Noctis,” Gladio says. Until now, he’s been vague about his life before the long dark. He never told her he served Noct. He’s never said he was born just to die for the crown. It never seemed to matter much. They were too busy trying to survive, and anyway, Liv never asked. “The King of Lucis. I was his Shield.”  
  
“Get out,” she gasps, slapping his arm. “How come you never told me?”  
  
“Didn’t wanna upset you. And it doesn’t matter now, anyway. He’s dead.”  
  
“Oh, shit, honey. I’m sorry.”  
  
“It’s fine.” He points to the photo of them on the beach. “The blond one is Prompto. He and Noct were best friends. Couldn’t keep ‘em apart.”  
  
Liv nods, fingering the edge of the photo of Ignis at Hammerhead. “And him?”  
  
_He’s the one._  
  
He can’t say that, though. Not to Liv. Not when he’s never even said it to Ignis.  
  
He shoves the carton of milk back in the fridge and slams the door. “Nobody,” he says.

  
*

  
Next to him, Liv sleeps. But Gladio lies awake, his hand down his boxer shorts, and thinks about shooting his load inside of Ignis.  
  
It’s been six years since he moved out of their apartment over the junk shop. The Ignis he fought beside in Insomnia isn’t the one he left behind that night. There’s a new confidence to the way he moves. He inhabits his blindness like it’s always been with him. Yeah, the veneer of civility is still there, but the Ignis underneath is less willing to suffer bullshit. He’s sharper, tougher, maybe even deadlier.  
  
And oh, gods, he’s beautiful. More beautiful than ever. The years and the hard times have cut the baby fat from his face. The bones of his jaw and cheeks are more prominent now, but his skin is as smooth and clear as Gladio remembers it. And Shiva’s tits, his lips. They look so soft, so gods-damned kissable, scar and all. Gladio wants them on his mouth, his body, his cock. He bites back a desperate sound as he imagines Ignis pulling back his foreskin and closing those full lips over the head of his dick.  
  
There are other things he can’t forget, either, like the golden hair on the curve of Ignis’s ass, and the trio of freckles that march down his left hip. Gladio used to kiss them one by one, tasting the salt of Ignis’s skin.  
  
He left Ignis for a reason, but day by day, he questions why the hell he thought it was so important. There’s no one left for Ignis to fight. There’s no one left for Gladio to protect. Now that Noct is gone, the life he was supposed to lead—the life he _thought_ he was supposed to lead, anyway—doesn’t matter. Lucis doesn’t need another Amicitia. And he doesn’t love Liv. He never really did. Every time he fucks her, he closes his eyes and thinks of Ignis.  
  
He can’t propose to her. He can’t lie here anymore pretending she’s the one he wants to kiss when he opens his eyes in the morning.  
  
Next to him, Liv rolls over and drapes an arm across him, murmuring in her sleep. And Gladio pulls his hand out of his boxer shorts, wondering what the fuck he’s gonna do.

  
*

  
He cares too much about people’s feelings to be any good at breakups. Leaving Liv is no different. That’s why it takes him a couple of weeks to bite the bullet.  
  
When he finally does it, she stands in the doorway of their bedroom and watches him pack his bags, looking small and drawn in the beige cardigan she hugs around herself. She doesn’t say anything. Shit, she even gathers his toiletries from the bathroom and tucks them into the suitcase he left by the door. It’s weird. It’s not like Liv.  
  
He almost wishes she’d scream and throw things at him instead.  
  
“Do you have somewhere to go?” she finally asks.  
  
“Yeah. Gonna crash on Iris’s couch for a few days,” he says, shoving a hoodie into his duffel bag before pulling the zipper closed. “I’ll look for a new place while I’m there.”  
  
He picks up the suitcase next to her, and she wordlessly moves to let him pass. Her shuffling footsteps follow him down the hallway. She stops in the kitchen doorway, fingering the hem of her cardigan nervously, and watches him as he crams his feet into his boots.  
  
“So this is it?” she says, hollow eyes trained on him. “After six years, you won’t even talk it out?”  
  
Gladio sighs as he ties up the laces. “There’s nothing to talk about. I’ve made my choice.”  
  
“Well, was it something I did? Maybe I can fix it.”  
  
“It’s nothing you did.”  
  
And that’s just honesty. For all her faults, she’s a good woman—passionate and kind, sensitive and loving—but his heart has belonged to someone else from day one. She never had a chance.  
  
“Is it because I can’t have a baby?”  
  
Fuck. He closes his eyes and lets his head fall back against the wall. Of course she’d bring this up. Of fucking course. It doesn’t matter that Liv can’t give him a kid. Even if she could, he wouldn’t want it. “Liv, that’s not fair.”  
  
“But it’s true?”  
  
“No,” he snaps. “You think I’d be that much of an asshole?”  
  
Her lower lip starts to quiver. She sucks it between her teeth, her eyes shining with tears. “Then what is it? Is there someone else?”  
  
He sighs and slings his bag over his shoulder. “Liv—”  
  
“There is, isn’t there?” It’s like the truth dawns on her all at once. She looks at the photo of Ignis, stuck to the fridge under a magnet of the Coernix Station logo. Her voice rises. “Him. That’s why you couldn’t tell me his name. All those times you stood there, drinking milk out of the carton, staring at your pictures…you weren’t thinking about the others. You were thinking about him.”  
  
“Liv, come on—”  
  
“Tell me I’m wrong.”  
  
He can’t meet her eye. He can’t bring himself to deny it, either.  
  
“You’d rather look at his fucked-up face than mine?” She’s practically shouting now, loud enough for the neighbours to hear.  
  
“That’s enough,” he growls, grabbing her wrist when she raises it to hit him. “Calm the fuck down, Liv. I’m not cheating on you. I left him before you were in the picture, and I’ve hardly talked to him since.”  
  
“But you’re still in love with him?”  
  
Gladio doesn’t say anything, but the look on his face must be plain enough.  
  
“Go on, then,” she snarls, wrenching her wrist out of his grasp. “Get out. Crawl back to your blind lover, if he’ll still have you.”  
  
She snatches the photo of Ignis off the fridge and tears it up, throwing the pieces in his face.  


  
*

  
When he drops his things off at Iris’s apartment, she tries to get him to stay for dinner, but he needs to be alone, to think about what the hell he’s gonna do next. He’s thirty-three years old. Sleeping on his kid sister’s couch is gonna get old real quick. At least he has a job, but he wants a place of his own. Housing is still at a premium. Some of the refugees who came to Lestallum have already left the city, bound for whatever country bumpkin craphole they came from, but others have chosen to stay. He can’t really blame them. After ten years, Lestallum is their home.  
  
It’s his home now, too.  
  
He shrugs on his jacket and goes to the Hobgoblin’s Lair, bent on drowning his sorrows.  
  
Because it doesn’t matter where he lives or what kind of job he has. A long time ago, he made a mistake, and he can’t stop kicking himself for never making it right. How the hell is he supposed to be happy if Ignis doesn’t want him anymore?  
  
Does he even deserve to have what he wants? He failed Ignis. He failed Noct. Shit.  
  
Still…he left Liv so he could take a shot at happiness. So that’s what he’s gonna do.  
  
Three beers in, he picks up his phone and starts to punch in Ignis’s number. Almost as quickly, his nerve leaves him, and he puts the phone back down. Shit. He chugs the rest of his beer and runs a hand through his hair, jiggling his foot anxiously on the bar stool. Before he can talk himself out of it, he hits the dial key.  
  
Ignis answers on the fourth ring. “Scientia speaking.”  
  
“Hey. Iggy.” He probably shouldn’t use that old nickname now, but he just can’t break himself of the habit. “It’s Gladio.”  
  
There’s a moment of silence on the other end before Ignis responds. “Gladio?”  
  
“Look, I know I’m probably the last person you wanna hear from right now, but I have to talk to you.”  
  
Another long beat of silence. Gladio thinks he’s going to hang up, but to his surprise, Ignis says, “Certainly. I’m free now, if you’d like to drop by. I was in the middle of making supper.”  
  
“You sure? I don’t wanna intrude or anything.”  
  
“It’s no bother,” Ignis says. “There’s more than enough for two.”  
  
“All right.” Gladio swallows, trying to stop his churning stomach from flopping out through his mouth. Could it really be this easy? He thought Ignis would tell him to fuck off. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

  
*

  
He knocks on Ignis’s door, then stands there with his clammy hands stuffed in his pockets, listening to the clatter of pans within. The beer’s gone sour in his gut. He thinks he’s gonna barf, or maybe pass out, or do both at the same time.  
  
Shit. Why is he so nervous? It’s just Ignis.  
  
Who probably hates him after everything Gladio put him through, if their ride from Hammerhead back to Lestallum was any indication.  
  
The door opens just as he raises his hand to knock again. Ignis stands there, wearing a long black apron over grey slacks and a black dress shirt. He’s left the top two buttons undone. Gladio’s gaze drops to the exposed triangle of skin, then moves back up to Ignis’s face. Behind his shades, his clouded eye blinks at the hollow of Gladio’s throat.  
  
“Gladio,” he says. He moves aside and holds the door open in invitation. “Come in.”  
  
Gladio steps inside, shrugging out of his jacket. “How’d you know it was me?”  
  
“Your scent,” Ignis says. “It’s very distinct.”  
  
Gladio’s dick twitches in his pants. Fucking Six. Ignis can smell him, even from this distance?  
  
“Besides, you told me you were coming, so it was a reasonable deduction,” Ignis adds.  
  
Gladio hangs his jacket on a hook just inside the door and watches as Ignis walks back into the kitchen, trying not to stare at the tight curve of his ass in his tailored pants. There’s a pan of fish frying on the stove, and a half-empty glass of red wine sits on the countertop. Ignis takes a sip from it before he gets back to cooking.  
  
“How are you?” he asks.  
  
“Not bad.” Gladio follows him into the kitchen, folding his arms as he leans on the counter next to Ignis. It’s weird, being back here. He remembers kissing Ignis against this counter, tasting his hesitant lips for the first time, all those years ago. “Still getting used to Noct being gone.”  
  
Ignis nods, turning the filet of fish over in the pan with a pair of tongs. “I’d say the worst part is that it feels so normal. We spent ten years without him before he…”  
  
“Yeah,” Gladio says, when Ignis trails off. Talking about Noct is hard for him, too. “You don’t have to say it. I get it.”  
  
Ignis downs the rest of his wine and sets the glass back on the counter with a hollow clink. “There are no daemons to hunt, either. No road trip to coordinate. No strategic decisions to be made. I’ve never been so idle in my life.”  
  
“Must be hard for you.”  
  
“It certainly hasn’t been easy.” Ignis shuts off the stove and moves the pan to a cold element. “But let’s hold that thought for the moment, shall we? Supper is ready.”  
  
Gladio sets the table while Ignis dishes out the food. It’s a new addition to the apartment, huge, heavy, and hewn from mahogany. Ignis could probably seat twelve people around it, if he wanted to. But it’s the only thing that’s changed. The shelving units along the walls are still stuffed with all the books they collected. Across from it, there’s the coffee table Prompto salvaged from an abandoned house in Old Lestallum, and the shabby blue couch where Gladio used to read to Ignis on sweltering nights. Shit, it feels just like yesterday he was sitting there with Ignis’s feet in his lap.  
  
And it feels like a lifetime ago.  
  
Shaking his head, Gladio fills two wine glasses with the open bottle of red in the kitchen.  
  
“This smells delicious,” he says as he sits down.  
  
Ignis tunes the radio to a classic rock station, setting the volume to low, before he sits. The muted squeal of guitars crackles from the speakers. “Let’s hope it tastes as good as it smells.”  
  
“I bet it does.” Gladio cuts a chunk off the filet and stuffs it into his mouth. It’s juicy, tender, and candied with a citrusy crust. His eyes flutter shut as the flavours run over his tastebuds. It’s been so gods-damned long since he’s had food this good. “Yeah, it definitely does. Damn, Iggy. How do you do it?”  
  
“Plenty of practice, I daresay.” Ignis chews his fish thoughtfully, his blind eye staring right at Gladio. “And plenty of help. Iris and Talcott have been kind to me over the years.”  
  
Gladio nods, poking his fork at a piece of lettuce. “Yeah, Iris is a good kid.”  
  
“A good woman,” Ignis corrects him. He taps his lower lip with the pointy end of his knife. “How old is she now? Twenty-five?”  
  
“Yeah. Almost twenty-six, actually.”  
  
“It’s hard to believe so much time has passed.” Ignis takes a sip of his wine, laughing ruefully. “I remember the days when she stashed stuffed moogles all over the Citadel because she couldn’t find anyone else to play hide and seek with her.”  
  
Gladio laughs, too. “And then Dad would try to be stern with her. ‘The Citadel is no place for this childish tomfoolery!’ he’d bellow. ‘What would the king say if he knew?’ He couldn’t stay mad for long, though. Iris was his baby. All she had to do was let her chin quiver, and Dad was a goner.”  
  
“Indeed. She had him wrapped around her little finger.”  
  
“Can’t blame him. She was cute.”  
  
Ignis offers him a soft smile. “She had her big brother wrapped around her little finger, too.”  
  
“You got me there.”  
  
“I always envied you, you know,” Ignis says. “You were so lucky to have a family. Even after Insomnia fell and you lost your father, you still had Iris. I’ve often wondered what that feels like, to have someone who will always be there for you.”  
  
Ah, shit. What’s he supposed to say to that? _You have me_? That’s just not true. _I’m sorry I left you alone?_ That’d sound insincere as hell. He flounders, his mouth opening then closing, grasping for the right words.  
  
But Ignis saves him with the shake of his head. “Never mind that. Are you still working at the gymnasium?”  
  
“Yeah.” Gladio lets out a relieved breath. “Lost a few clients since the sun came back, but that’s not really surprising, seein’ as so many people are leaving Lestallum. How about you?”  
  
“Talcott was here a couple of weeks ago to help me set up a partnership with one of the vendors at the market. He’s letting me share his stall three days a week so I can sell bread and pastries. I’ll give him a cut of the profits, and he’ll be my eyes.”  
  
Gladio frowns. “Is that enough to get by on?”  
  
“I saved up quite a bit while I was hunting,” Ignis says lightly. “I can probably live comfortably for the next six months without having to lift a finger. Of course, I’d rather it didn’t come to that.”  
  
“Anything I can do to help?”  
  
“Thank you, Gladio, but I’ve made it this far on my own. I’ll manage.” There’s a moment of silence as his fork seeks out the heap of rice on his plate. “You said you wanted to discuss something. What was it?”  
  
Gladio’s stomach does a somersault. They were so busy reminiscing that he almost forgot why he came here. Almost. It’s always been in the back of his mind. And it’s now or never. He takes a deep breath and says, “I made a huge mistake.”  
  
Ignis frowns at him. “A mistake?”  
  
“I wanna be with you.”  
  
Ignis sighs and sets his fork down. “Gladio—”  
  
“Wait, hear me out.” Gladio reaches for his wine glass and takes a huge gulp. Hell, he’s gonna need it. “I know I don’t have any right to ask for a second chance. But I have to. I wish I’d never left that night. Wish I’d answered your phone calls.” Across from him, Ignis’s face is carefully blank of expression, just like that night in the truck. “Fuck, Iggy, I miss you.”  
  
“What would you like me to say, Gladio?”  
  
“I dunno. Whatever’s on your mind.”  
  
“Well, I hardly know what to think,” Ignis says, placing his napkin on the tabletop. “Do you want me to tell you I miss you too? That I lie awake every night, longing for your embrace? I can’t, Gladio, because I don’t.”  
  
“I know, I know, I just—”  
  
Ignis’s mouth twists into a humourless smile. “Were you expecting me to swoon into your arms? This isn’t one of your romance novels. You left me, Gladio.”  
  
“Yeah, and I was stupid. I get that,” Gladio says, swallowing his frustration. “But are you really gonna sit there and tell me you don’t feel anything for me?”  
  
Ignis heaves an exasperated sigh, slides out of his chair, and takes his empty plate and wine glass into the kitchen. Gladio follows him. No way is he gonna let him wriggle out of this conversation.  
  
“Don’t walk away from me,” he says.  
  
Ignis turns on the tap and runs the plate under it. “This is not a conversation I wish to have. I’ve made my feelings clear.”  
  
“After I left, you kept asking me to come home. So why won’t you let me?”  
  
“Because it’s too late for that, Gladio.” Ignis scrubs the plate violently with a dishcloth. “I gave you ample chances. You rejected each and every one of them.” He rinses the wine glass and sets it on the counter. “The longer we were apart, the more I came to see that you didn’t care for my feelings or what I wanted from life.”  
  
“That wasn’t my intention.” Gladio gently takes his arm and turns him until they’re facing each other. Behind his shades, Ignis is frowning, his mouth pressed into a thin line. “I didn’t want you to get hurt. That’s all. Figured you’d be safer here, where the daemons couldn’t come.”  
  
“I didn’t ask you to protect me.”  
  
“Well, I wanted to. If anything’d happened to you—”  
  
“I was prepared to take that risk,” Ignis snaps. “You, of all people, should understand that.”  
  
“Dammit, I do, Iggy,” he shoots back, slamming his hand on the counter, “but I need _you_ to understand that I couldn’t lose you. Not after Dad, not after Noct. Fuck, it would’ve killed me.”  
  
Ignis tuts in annoyance, shaking his head. “There’s no need for such drama.”  
  
He tries to turn back to the sink, but Gladio catches him by the arm and plucks the shades off his face, tossing them onto the counter. Ignis’s milky eye blinks in surprise. Years ago, when his wounds were still fresh, there were people who reacted with fear and disgust. No one said anything to his face, but Gladio saw the way they’d do a double-take or cover their kids’ eyes so they wouldn’t have to look at him.  
  
Ignis knew, though. That’s why he’s always worn the shades, day and night. Even now, when Gladio strokes the scar tissue under Ignis’s left eye, bringing his lips to graze the flattened, discoloured lid, Ignis tries to duck his head, like he’s ashamed.  
  
“Don’t do that,” Gladio says.  
  
“Do what?”  
  
“Turn away from me. You know I like looking at you.”  
  
“You presume too much.”  
  
“I love you,” Gladio insists. He cradles Ignis’s face with one hand, his thumb stroking over his cheek. He wishes, not for the first time, that Ignis could see how much he means it. “Never should’ve left your side.”  
  
Ignis ignores his declaration, pulling away. “It’s for the best that you did.”  
  
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”  
  
Ignis takes the plate from the sink and starts to dry it with a dishtowel. “You always need someone to protect, Gladio. First it was Noct. Then me. And now that woman you’re going to marry.”  
  
“I broke it off with Liv.”  
  
“Oh? I’m sorry to hear that.” Ignis slides the plate onto the stack in the cupboard. “But as it turns out, I didn’t need your protection. Without you, I had to rely on myself again. I learned how to fight so I could be of service to Noct. I made a living and I helped people, and I did it all on my own, Gladio.”  
  
“I know. I’m proud of you.”  
  
“Are you? I find that difficult to believe. You never seemed to think I could do it.”  
  
“And I said I was an asshole. How many fucking times do I have to apologize?”  
  
Ignis shakes his head, tutting in disgust, and tries to push past him. Gladio won’t let him, though. He doesn’t even think about how wrong it is. He just grabs Ignis and kisses him, crushing him against his chest. Ignis makes a small sound of surprise. His hands fist in the fabric of Gladio’s shirt, and his lips part under Gladio’s mouth. For a second, Gladio thinks it’s going to be all right.  
  
But then Ignis shoves him away, his cheeks flushing scarlet, and wipes his mouth on his sleeve.  
  
“Don’t touch me,” he snaps, putting out a hand, as if to keep Gladio at bay. “You don’t have the right.”  
  
“Iggy, I—”  
  
“Don’t call me that.”  
  
“Ignis. Please.” Gladio watches as Ignis dries his wine glass with shaking hands, as he places it in the cupboard, too. “There has to be something I can do to make it up to you.”  
  
“Let me make myself clear.” Ignis slams the cupboard door closed, his voice seething with barely restrained anger. “You treated me like a child—like something you had to keep in a cage—and tried to convince me it was for my own good. You belittled my calling to serve my king. You put your hand on my throat, Gladio, and made me feel powerless. What sort of delusion are you under, to think that I would ever give us a second chance?”  
  
Gladio’s face flushes. He doesn’t need Ignis to remind him about all this shit. He already knows. Hardly a day goes by where he doesn’t think about how wrong he was. “I just wanted to keep you safe.”  
  
“And I exhausted myself telling you that your protection was unwanted,” Ignis shoots back.  
  
“Yeah, and I wish I’d listened to you. What else do you want me to say?”  
  
Ignis sighs and bows his head, letting his hand drop to the counter. “I don’t want you to say anything. I want you to get out.” When Gladio doesn’t move, he says, more forcefully, “Go, Gladio. You’re not wanted here.”  
  
Gladio nods, numb, and takes his jacket from the hook. He lets himself out of the apartment, his feet leading him down the stairs and into the deserted alleyway outside.  
  
He thought it would hurt if Ignis hated him.  
  
Turns out there’s nothing worse than his indifference.

  
*

  
The next day, he gets a call from an unknown number with a Crown City area code. He squints at his call display for a second, stunned, his book forgotten in his lap. Should he answer it? Who the hell would be dialing him from Insomnia? As far as he can tell, everyone he knows is still in Lestallum. Everyone except Prompto and Cindy.  
  
That’s what convinces him to pick up, but it isn’t Prompto on the other end of the line. It’s another familiar voice that greets him.  
  
“Gladio. How are you doing?”  
  
“Cor,” Gladio says, surprised. “Wasn’t expecting to hear from you.”  
  
“I meant to call sooner. I’ve been busy, though.” He pauses, and Gladio waits for him to speak again. “I’m back in Insomnia with Dustin and a group of volunteers. We’ve been getting the Citadel cleaned up and figuring out how to go forward from here. This is a crucial time for Lucis. We need a new government. A new direction.”  
  
Gladio nods. He’s not surprised Cor would take charge of the country’s reconstruction, but hearing him talk like a gods-damned politician is something else. “Yeah? And how’s that working out for you?”  
  
“I’ve been in touch with First Secretary Claustra over in Altissia. Based on what she said, it sounds like they managed to hold things mostly together through the darkness. They kept their hospitals open, their scientists working, and their architects building. She’s offered to send some of them here to help us put Lucis back together.”  
  
“That’s good news.”  
  
“It is.”  
  
Something tells him Cor didn’t call to give him an update, though. “What does it have to do with me?”  
  
“You’re the last Shield,” Cor says. “We could use someone like you at the Citadel. Right now, we’re looking at rebuilding, but eventually we’ll have to think about defense and sovereignty. We’ll need someone to command our army. I want that someone to be you.”  
  
Gladio bites his lip. The economy’s still a wreck, and he can’t teach self-defense down at the gym forever. Cor isn’t just offering him a job—he’s offering Gladio a career, a purpose. He’d be stupid to turn it down.  
  
But Gladio doesn’t want to go where Ignis isn’t.  
  
“It’s a lot to take in. Can I think about it?” he asks.  
  
 “I’ll give you a week,” Cor says. “We have to move quickly on this.”  
  
“Yeah, I know. Thanks.”  
  
“Think about what your father would say.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll be in touch.”  
  
They say their goodbyes. Gladio hangs up just as the key turns in the lock and Iris lets herself in. Her arms are full of paper bags. Gladio gets up off the couch to help her, and when she smiles at him gratefully, it tugs at the scar that splits her right cheek from the corner of her lip to her ear. He can’t remember anymore how she got it. They all have so many scars now.  
  
“You okay?” she asks as she pulls a cabbage out of one bag. “You have a face like a thundercloud.”  
  
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just got a call from Cor. He wants me to go to Insomnia and work for him.”  
  
She raises her eyebrows at him. “Really? That’s awesome! Did you accept?”  
  
“Said I’d think about it.”  
  
“What’s there to think about?” She opens the fridge and starts piling carrots, celery, and Leiden peppers into the vegetable drawer. “Sounds like a no-brainer to me.”  
  
He shrugs and pulls a vial of yellow spice out of the bag he’s holding, examining it in the late afternoon sunlight that spills through the window over the sink. “Just not sure I wanna leave Lestallum, that’s all.”  
  
“Gladdy, come on.” Iris takes the vial from his hand and fixes him with her best stern-little-sister frown. Astrals, it reminds him so much of their dad. “You can’t hang around here because of Ignis. You messed up, and now you have to let him go. That’s life.”  
  
“Yeah, but—”  
  
She taps him on the nose with the vial. “No. Shush. You can’t make him love you again.”  
  
Maybe she’s right. He doesn’t know what else he can say to change Ignis’s mind. If nothing else, Ignis is a stubborn bastard, and now that he’s rediscovered his independence, there’s no reason for him to give Gladio the time of day.  
  
Still, he can’t stop hoping.  
  
“Harassing him about your feelings definitely won’t help,” she adds, like she’s read his mind. She digs in the bag again and pulls out a tomato, which she tosses to him. It smacks him in the arm and lands on the floor with a dull thud. “Seriously, Gladdy, enough about Ignis.” She rolls her eyes and picks up the tomato, shoving it into his chest. “Now give me a hand with dinner, please, if you wanna eat sometime tonight.”

  
*

  
Two days later, the shrill ringing of his phone wakes him. Blearily, cursing, his face still buried in his pillow, he reaches for it on the bedside table and manages to knock it onto the floor with a clatter. Fuck. He heaves himself over on the mattress, groping blindly under the bed until his hand closes around it, and brings it to his ear on the sixth ring.  
  
“Yeah?” he grunts.  
  
“Gladio. It’s me.”  
  
Ignis. He lifts his head so fast he nearly gives himself whiplash. “Hi.”  
  
“I apologize if I woke you up,” Ignis says, his voice hesitating. “How are you?”  
  
Gladio runs a hand through his hair and rolls onto his back. The room is already bright with sunlight. Why the fuck is Ignis calling him? He’s still smarting from their conversation the other day. “I’m okay. What time is it?”  
  
“Ten forty-five.”  
  
“Shit.” He groans, rubbing a hand over his face, realizing he hasn’t shaved in three days.  
  
“I suppose I should get directly to the point,” Ignis says.  
  
“Iggy, look, I get it. It was wrong, what I did the other day.” He blows out a breath. Maybe Iris was right. As much as it hurts, it’s the right thing to do. It’s time to let Ignis go. “I’ve been a total asshole. I’m sorry and I won’t bother—”  
  
“Let me finish, Gladio.” He hears the breath Ignis draws on the other end of the line, like he’s bracing himself for a punch to the gut. “I’d like you to take me out for dinner tonight. If you’re amenable to the idea, of course.”  
  
Gladio’s heart leaps into his throat. “You mean like a date?”  
  
“In a manner of speaking.”  
  
“Are you sure?”  
  
“Yes.” There’s a brief pause. “Iris told me you’ve been moping around the house for the last three days. I suppose the least I can do is hear you out. Perhaps we can come to an understanding.”  
  
Great. Leave it to Iris to meddle. “Okay. I mean, yeah. Fuck, yeah, I’d love to take you out. Do you want me to pick you up?”  
  
“No. I’ll meet you at Lucia’s Bistro at seven. Do you know where it is?”  
  
Gladio racks his brain. A few restaurants have popped up since they brought back the light, but he hasn’t been to any of them. “That little hole in the wall on the main drag?”  
  
“Yes. If you arrive before me, please get us a table on the patio.”  
  
“Okay.” He’s grinning so hard his face hurts. “See you then.”  
  
It’s his day off, but he wishes he was working, if only to pass the hours. They crawl by like a half dead voretooth on the side of the highway. He sits in Iris’s kitchen, watching the clock as he eats scrambled eggs on toast, then goes to the gym to work off some of his nerves. By the time four rolls around, he starts getting ready to go out. He stands under the shower head, letting the water wash his sweat and anxiety down the drain, and thinks about how he’s going to play things tonight.  
  
Should he try to take Ignis’s hand?  
  
Or keep all his body parts to himself?  
  
Should he talk about his feelings?  
  
Or let Ignis steer the conversation?  
  
It feels like forever since he’s been on an actual date. When he and Ignis got together the first time, it just sort of…happened. There was no courtship. They fucked, and ate dinner on the couch, and fucked some more. It was the same with Liv. There wasn’t really _time_ to date; they were all too preoccupied with making it to tomorrow. The last time he went out with someone was more than ten years ago, well before he left Insomnia for good.  
  
It’s bad enough that he’s forgotten how to do it. Trying to win Ignis back makes it a million times harder.  
  
After his shower, he passes a clipper over his beard, blow-dries his hair, and ties it back in a loose bun. He changes his shirt four times before he laughs at himself in the mirror. It doesn’t matter what he wears. Ignis won’t know one way or the other. He wants to look good, though, if only for his own self-confidence, so he settles on a clingy blue henley and a pair of black jeans that hug his thighs.  
  
He does a three-sixty on his heel when he enters the kitchen. “So? Am I presentable?”  
  
Iris pauses over a pot of spaghetti sauce to whistle at him. “Not bad for an old guy, Gladdy. Not bad at all.”  
  
“Hey.” He swipes a breadstick out of the basket on the table and points it at her. “You watch your mouth. I ain’t old.”  
  
“You smell nice, too. New aftershave?”  
  
“Nah,” he says, snapping the breadstick between his teeth. “Just haven’t worn any for awhile.”  
  
She winks at him. “Well, I bet Iggy’ll like it.”  
  
“Let’s hope so.” Gladio grabs his jacket out of the closet and pulls open the door. “Don’t wait up for me. Wish me luck!”

  
*

  
Ignis is already waiting for him when he arrives. Gladio glimpses him as soon as he rounds the corner, and the sight of him makes him pause. He’s sitting at a table on the patio, relaxed, one arm slung over the back of the chair next to him. The fairy lights that hang from the trellis bathe his face in a soft glow. He’s left the collar of his white dress shirt unbuttoned, and Gladio can see the skull necklace he wears hanging in the opening, a dark bead against skin that looks impossibly soft.  
  
Gladio wipes his clammy palms on his jeans and forces himself to move. Ignis turns his head and smiles when Gladio pulls out the chair across from him.  
  
“Hey. You been waitin’ long?” Gladio asks.  
  
“Only a few minutes,” Ignis answers.  
  
“You picked a good place.” It’s near the end of Lestallum Main, where there’s less traffic, so they can hear each other talk. The tables are draped with white linens, and a tea light flickers in a glass cup in the middle of each. “Just opened last week, didn’t it?”  
  
Ignis nods. “Reopened, to be more precise. Lucia had to shut it down during the scourge.”  
  
Gladio nods, flipping open the menu. It’s printed on thick, matte paper, and he tries not to think too hard about the prices listed next to dishes that have names he can’t even pronounce. What the hell is an anak remoulade, anyway?  
  
“So what’s good?” he asks. A waiter comes by to fill his water. Gladio nods his thanks and lifts it to his lips, just to keep his hands occupied. “I don’t know what half this shit is.”  
  
Ignis laughs softly. “I think the pan-seared bulette sirloin would agree with you nicely.”  
  
“You know me so well.”  
  
“Perhaps not as well as I used to.” When Gladio doesn’t say anything, he adds, “But I would like us to get reacquainted.”  
  
“Well, I got all night.”  
  
A silence falls. Gladio fingers the corner of his menu, his innards suddenly squirming. What should he say? The last time they tried to have a conversation, Ignis kicked him out of his apartment. Sure, Ignis seems more willing to listen now, but that doesn’t mean he’s gonna change his mind about getting back together at the end of the night.  
  
“What have you been doing with yourself?” Ignis finally asks.  
  
They already talked about this the other night, but it’s a safe question, so Gladio ain’t gonna protest. He leans back in his chair and links his fingers over his belly. “Still working at the gym. I teach self-defense classes four days a week and do personal training at all hours. Been in talks with the owner of the Hobgoblin’s Lair about a bouncing gig, too. A bit of extra cash never hurts.”  
  
“Mmm. I imagine it gets rowdy there near closing time.”  
  
“It ain’t so bad. Most of the regulars are grizzled old guys who don’t know what to do with themselves now that there are no daemons to hunt.”  
  
Ignis nods. “It’s been difficult. But there will be more work soon enough.”  
  
The waiter bustles over then, notebook open. Ignis orders Gladio the pan-seared bulette sirloin and a baked trevally filet for himself. Then, as if it’s an afterthought, he asks for a bottle of vintage Cleigne red.  
  
Gladio raises an eyebrow. “A whole bottle?”  
  
“If we’re going to be here for a while, we may as well enjoy it.” Ignis smiles and sips from his water glass. “So you’ve been living with Iris?”  
  
“Yeah. Not for much longer, though.” Gladio plays with the handle of his fork where it lies on the tablecloth, wondering how much he should say. “Actually, Cor called me a couple of days ago. Said he had work for me, if I was interested.”  
  
Ignis’s expression doesn’t change. “Did he, now?”  
  
“Said he’s putting together a government and rebuilding Insomnia. Guess he thinks I could be of some use.”  
  
“I don’t doubt that,” Ignis says softly. “An Amicitia would be a valuable asset to his administration.” The waiter returns with their bottle. Gladio pours for both of them, and Ignis takes a sip from his glass, plainly savouring it. “And what was your response?”  
  
Gladio shrugs. “Told him I’d think about it. I’ve been living here so long, I dunno if I want to leave, y’know?”  
  
“I do understand,” Ignis says. “As it happens, Cor contacted me with a similar offer.”  
  
Gladio’s heartbeat quickens. If Cor offered Ignis a job, there’s no doubt in his mind that Ignis has already accepted it—or if he hasn’t accepted, then he will soon. And where will that leave him?  
  
He licks his lips and asks, “What did you say?”  
  
“I gave him the same answer, of course. It’s a lot to think about.”  
  
“Is it what you want?”  
  
“I don’t know what I want, Gladio.” Ignis fingers the stem of his glass, his brows knitting behind his shades. “I spent so long in Noct’s service that the person I am outside of it is…unclear to me. Pursuing employment under Cor would be the logical course of action. My skills would be of use in his administration.”  
  
Gladio leans across the table. He doesn’t wanna hear about what Ignis thinks he should do; he wants to know what he’s _going_ to do. “You sound like you’re trying to convince yourself.”  
  
“Perhaps I am.” He shakes his head. “In any case, I haven’t decided yet. It will require a great deal more thought.”  
  
“What’s keeping you here?”  
  
Ignis gives a half shrug, his frown deepening. “I’m…not sure.”  
  
The waiter interrupts with their dishes. Gladio drapes his napkin over his lap and breathes in the rich, spicy aroma of his sirloin. It smells so damn tempting that his stomach growls, almost embarrassingly loud, and he laughs. Ignis chuckles along with him.  
  
“Ah, yes, the formidable Amicitia appetite,” Ignis says.  
  
Gladio cuts into the steak. “Gotta feed these muscles somehow.”  
  
They eat in silence for a few minutes. Gladio’s glad the food came when it did, because he’s still not sure what to say. He feels like Ignis invited him here to explain himself, but bringing up their argument when things are going so well seems like a bad idea. He thought Ignis might be the one to broach the topic.  
  
But maybe it’s awkward for him, too.  
  
He swallows the chunk of meat in his mouth and washes it down with a gulp of wine. “Why did you change your mind?”  
  
“I haven’t changed my mind. I’m merely giving you a chance to show me you’re the man you say you are. The man I believed you to be before—”  
  
“I know, I know,” Gladio says, waving his fork, “I just meant…last time I saw you, it sounded like you never wanted to see me again.”  
  
“I told you on the phone. Iris said you were sulking around the apartment.”  
  
“Yeah, but I ain’t your responsibility.”  
  
Ignis’s lips pull into a little smile. “Perhaps not, but I still care for your well-being, Gladio.”  
  
Gladio has to smile, too. It’s such an Ignis thing to say. Has the man ever held a grudge against anyone in his life? “Look, Ignis, I meant what I said on the phone. Grabbing you like that the other day was wrong.” He blows out a breath. “Leaving you like I did was wrong, too. I was so damn stressed, trying to make ends meet and stop the world from falling apart, and so damn scared of losing you, I didn’t even think about what you wanted. I’m sorry.”  
  
“I appreciate that, but you could have shared the burden. I wanted to shoulder it with you.”  
  
Gladio shakes his head. “You’re the strongest person I know. But you went through hell, and I didn’t want anyone to hurt you ever again.”  
  
“Life is pain, Gladio. You can’t protect me from that.”  
  
“I thought I could try.”  
  
“Gladio, please understand.” Ignis pats at his mouth with his napkin before setting it down on the table. “I wanted to be your partner, not your dependent. That’s what a true relationship should be, shouldn’t it? Facing the darkness together, hand in hand?”  
  
“And I get that,” Gladio says. “Just took me a long time to see it.”  
  
“I wish you’d realized it six years ago.”  
  
Gladio nods, his throat closing up. No one wishes that more than he does.  
  
After their meal, they finish the bottle of wine, and Gladio walks with Ignis the three blocks back to his apartment. He stands there with his hands shoved in his pockets, watching Ignis run his fingers over all the keys on his keyring until he finds the one that fits the outer door. Is Ignis expecting a goodnight kiss? Last time Gladio puts his lips on him, Ignis pushed him away. And this isn’t like a normal date—hell, it’s been more of a test than anything.  
  
“I suppose this is where we part ways,” Ignis says, turning to face him, one foot up on the doorstep.  
  
“I had fun,” he says. Should he make the first move? Or let Ignis take the lead on this one? “Thanks for asking me out.”  
  
Ignis smiles. “It was rather enjoyable, wasn’t it?”  
  
“Yeah.” He looks at Ignis’s lips, wrestling with the desire to yank him into his arms and never let him go. “I guess I’ll be in touch.”  
  
Ignis hesitates on the doorstep. If there’s any time to kiss him, it’s now. Gladio steps forward, but maybe he’s too quiet for Ignis to hear, because then Ignis nods, pushes the door open, and steps inside. “Goodnight, then.”  
  
“Night,” Gladio echoes. “Sweet dreams.”  
  
The door closes behind Ignis, leaving Gladio standing in the empty alleyway, feeling like he’s let something precious slip between his fingers.

  
*

  
He thinks that’s the end of it, but the next day, Ignis calls him and invites him out for a picnic.  
  
Gladio tries not to read too much into it.  
  
Not after the awkward way they parted last night.  
  
He borrows Dave’s truck and pulls up outside Ignis’s apartment at two in the afternoon, just like Ignis asked. He’s already waiting outside for Gladio, carrying a basket in one hand with a black and white checkered blanket draped over his arm. It’s so normal, so fucking quaint, that Gladio has to laugh to himself before he gets out of the truck to give Ignis a hand up.  
  
Gladio drives them west, up to a knoll overlooking the Taelpar Crag. There’s no one else here, except for a few anak stags grazing in the rolling fields below, but they’re too far away to be much of a problem. Fighting against the wind, Gladio spreads the blanket out on the grass, and Ignis starts to unpack the basket, producing a pair of garulessa sandwiches on crusty bread, a bunch of rice balls, and two thin slices of chiffon cake wrapped in paper.  
  
The beer comes out next, a Leide pilsner Gladio used to drink back in Insomnia—usually with his dad, in the kitchen of his childhood home, when they needed to unwind after a long day.  
  
Gladio whistles, accepting the bottle Ignis hands him. “Shit, Iggy, you went all out.”  
  
“This? It’s nothing.”  
  
Ignis sits cross-legged on the blanket, and after popping the cap off his beer with his belt buckle, Gladio stretches out across from him, leaning on his elbow. With a content sigh, he sips at it, basking in the sun’s glow and the warm summer breeze that teases tendrils of his hair from its ponytail. For the space of a few breaths, he lets a pair of stags bantering in the valley hold his attention, and then he looks at Ignis.  
  
“Couldn’t resist coming back for more, huh?” he teases.  
  
Ignis smiles and holds out a sandwich for him to take. “I felt like we left some things undiscussed.”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Let’s eat first. I don’t want to spoil your appetite.”  
  
Shit. That doesn’t sound good.  
  
Already unsettled, he unwraps his sandwich and bites into it, and his eyes flutter closed in pleasure. It tastes better than anything Ignis ever made at camp, better by far, and that’s saying something. Juice from the thick-sliced garulessa meat bursts over his tongue, seasoned with spicy peppers and garlic. Some of it dribbles down his chin. He wipes it away with the back of his hand, instinctively ducking his head, even though Ignis can’t see the mess he’s making.  
  
When they’ve quietly demolished the rice balls and moved on to the chiffon cake, Ignis speaks again.  
  
“There was one thing you didn’t bring up last night that I want to talk about,” he says.  
  
Gladio nods, picking anxiously at the crust of the cake. “Tell me.”  
  
Ignis feels along the blanket until his hand meets the basket, and he places his empty bottle inside. “You said you never wanted anyone to hurt me again…but I can’t help thinking of that night we argued about daemon-hunting outside our apartment, and you grabbed me by the neck.”  
  
_Oh, Astrals. No._  
  
“…I’ve thought about that night often since we parted ways,” Ignis goes on. “I didn’t say anything at the time. I was so stunned, I hardly knew how to bring it up. I should have. I suppose I just couldn’t believe you would lay a hand on me like that. And over the years, I’ve let it poison my view of you.”  
  
Gladio’s entire body burns with shame. He regretted it the instant he felt Ignis’s pulse jumping like a terrified rabbit under his palm—but he never apologized for it, because he didn’t want to admit to being the guy who throttled his lover in a fit of rage.  
  
“Ignis…” He sits up and crosses his legs, placing his half-empty bottle between his thighs. He’s squeezing the neck so tight, it’s drained all the blood from his knuckles. “Fuck, I don’t even know what to say. ‘I’m sorry’ sounds kinda pathetic after all this time.”  
  
“Are you sorry?”  
  
“You really have to ask?” Ignis just frowns, and Gladio blows out a breath. Shit. He has to do this right. “Of course I’m sorry. I did a shitty job of protecting you, didn’t I?”  
  
“In that moment, yes.”  
  
Gladio shakes his head. “Did I ever tell you how I met Liv?”  
  
Ignis starts to pull his chiffon cake apart, but he doesn’t bring any of the pieces to his mouth. He leaves them scattered in the paper he wrapped them in. “No. You didn’t.”  
  
“She came to the gym one night all bloodied up and asked me to teach her self-defense,” Gladio says. “Her boyfriend lost everything when they left Leide, and he turned to drink. He started beating her. It pissed me off, knowing he was so fucking weak he had to hit the one person who’d stood beside him through everything.” He licks his lips, raising his eyes to Ignis’s face. “Maybe I’m just as weak as he was.”  
  
“I wouldn’t say that, Gladio.”  
  
“But it’s true, isn’t it? You pissed me off, and I reacted in the worst way.”  
  
“Did you ever hit her?”  
  
“Fuck, no.”  
  
Ignis crumples the paper around the debris of his cake. “And you never touched me before or after. You’re a passionate person, Gladio. You made a mistake, but you aren’t an abuser.”  
  
Gladio scratches the back of his neck. “I dunno…”  
  
“I know you,” Ignis says, placing the paper ball in the basket with his empty bottle. “And I forgive you.”  
  
Does he really deserve forgiveness? It seems too easy. “Ignis…”  
  
“That’s all I have to say on the matter.” Ignis gets to his feet, brushing grass off the ass of his pants. “Let’s pack up our things and go home.”  
  
They don’t say much on the way back to Lestallum. Ignis dozes against the window, while Gladio mulls over their conversation. Even though Ignis said he forgives him, he feels like it’s conditional, like it’s something he’ll revoke if Gladio fucks up again. He gave Gladio absolution, sure, but not his love, and it isn’t enough. Not enough to satisfy Gladio, anyway.  
  
Then again, maybe he doesn’t deserve to be happy. Maybe he has too much to atone for.  
  
Maybe—and this is what brings helpless tears to his eyes, makes him slam the heel of his palm on the steering wheel to stop himself from crying—maybe they’re both too different now to be together.  
  
New world. New lives. Nothing left in common but a shared tragedy.  
  
Ignis stirs when he pulls up outside the apartment and kills the engine. Gladio watches him lift his head from the window and run his fingers through his hair, stifling a yawn. He looks like he belongs there, sitting in the passenger seat next to Gladio.  
  
Whatever’s drawing him to Ignis is a living force. A magnetic impulse. It’s begging him to put his hand on Ignis’s cheek, to climb into his lap and kiss him, to join their bodies just the way they used to. The only thing stopping him is a single, quivering thread of willpower. How the hell can it be possible that Ignis doesn’t feel it?  
  
“Thank you,” Ignis says, opening the passenger side door.  
  
Gladio hops out and hurries around to help him down from the truck. When he takes Ignis’s hand, he doesn’t draw it back the way Gladio expected him to. Instead, he murmurs his thanks, only releasing it once he’s safely on the ground.  
  
“Can I see you again?” Gladio asks.  
  
Ignis smiles and kisses his cheek, just a whisper of lips on his skin, before he steps up onto the sidewalk. “I’ll think about it.”  


  
*

  
He hasn’t heard from Ignis in two days when Cor calls.  
  
“Yeah?” he grunts when he answers the phone.  
  
“Hello to you too,” Cor says dryly. “What’s got you in such a bad mood?”  
  
Gladio throws an arm behind his head, crossing his ankles as he lies on the couch, and stares up at the flap of paint peeling off the ceiling of Iris’s living room. “Nothing. Personal problems. What do you want?”  
  
Cor clicks his tongue in exasperation. “I’m calling to ask if you’ve made a decision about my offer yet.”  
  
Oh. Right. He’s been so busy agonizing over Ignis that he forgot Cor only gave him a week to choose.  
  
“Can I have a few more days?” he asks.  
  
“What’s the problem?” Cor asks. “This should be a no-brainer. I’m offering you a stable career and good money. You’ll be helping us make a better world. A new Lucis for the history books. Your father would tell you to take it.”  
  
Gladio chews his lip. He can’t leave Lestallum yet. Not until he knows for sure Ignis will never love him. “Did Ignis give you his answer yet?”  
  
Cor sighs, a tired, drawn-out expulsion of air. “You know, he said something similar to me.”  
  
“He did?” Gladio sits up, his heartbeat quickening. “What exactly did he say?”  
  
“Look, I’m not playing these schoolyard games with you two. Figure yourselves out, then get back to me. I’ll give you another day. Quit screwing around.”  
  
The line goes dead. Gladio sighs and drops his phone in his lap, his mind whirling. He doesn’t know what it means. Not for sure. Maybe Ignis wanted to be certain Gladio wouldn’t be going to Insomnia, too, before he accepted.  
  
But it’s also possible Ignis doesn’t want to go without him.  
  
He touches his cheek where Ignis kissed him the other day, and laughs softly to himself.

  
*

  
After the world’s fastest shower, he practically sprints to Ignis’s apartment. The sun is already setting, and fingers of copper light ripple over Lestallum’s industrial facade, drawing a curtain of shadows in their wake. A lone bum panhandles at the corner of Ignis’s street. Gladio’s so busy dialing Ignis’s number that he almost trips over him. The man grumbles at him, and Gladio tosses a couple of gil into the can of change he’s holding.  
  
“Hey,” he says breathlessly when Ignis picks up. “I’m standing outside, under your window. Can I take you out for drinks?”  
  
“You came all the way here to ask me that?”  
  
Gladio laughs. “Guess I got a little ahead of myself.” He glances up at the window, where Ignis’s shadow moves behind the drawn curtains. “So…?”  
  
“Let me put on some proper clothes. You’ve caught me scrubbing the bathtub. I’ll be down in five minutes.”  
  
Gladio spends those five minutes pacing the sidewalk, his heart racing, feeling like he’s about to jump out of his skin. It only gets worse when Ignis finally appears, dressed in a grey button-down and black slacks. They’ve known each other for twenty years, but seeing him now, it’s like they’re meeting in person for the first time.  
  
“Hi,” he says.  
  
“Hello,” Ignis responds, shrugging into a light jacket. The nights are getting colder now as summer turns to fall. “Where are you taking me?”  
  
“A hole in the wall just down the street. They keep the music low, so it’s good for talking.”  
  
They walk side by side the two blocks to the bar, bumping shoulders, their strides mis-matched. Ignis doesn’t say anything. Neither does Gladio. There’s something comfortable, something familiar, about the silence. Gladio takes it as a good sign.  
  
The place is almost empty when they arrive. It’s a small operation, with five seats at the bar and eight booths ringing the room. The air is almost always hazy with smoke, and tonight is no exception. A middle aged waitress smiles at them as they enter. Gladio smiles back and leads Ignis to a booth near the back, grabbing a menu on the way. He shrugs out of his jacket and tosses it on the bench before he slides in. Ignis sits across from him.  
  
“What can I get you guys?” the waitress asks as she swings by.  
  
“A Lestallum lager for me,” Gladio says, scanning the menu. “And a Cleigne red for him.”  
  
“Okay. I’ll be right back.”  
  
She takes the menu from him and bustles off to the bar. Gladio folds his hands on the table and glances at Ignis, finding him bobbing his head to the smooth tinkle of piano jazz that plays from the bar’s speakers. Damn, it’s cute. He’s itching to ask about his conversation with Cor, but he can’t bring himself to interrupt Ignis when he’s clearly enjoying himself.  
  
So he waits until the waitress brings them their drinks before he starts talking.  
  
“I talked to Cor today,” he says.  
  
Ignis lifts his wine glass to his lips. “Oh?”  
  
“He asked me if I made a decision.”  
  
“And have you?”  
  
Gladio shakes his head. “I asked him if you gave him your answer yet. He said you asked the same question about me.” Across the table, Ignis goes very still, pinching the stem of his wine glass between his index finger and thumb. “Ignis, I have to know…what do you want?”  
  
Ignis frowns. “I don’t understand what you mean.”  
  
“Do you want to go to Insomnia? Or do you want to stay in Lestallum?”  
  
“I’ve told you before, Insomnia would be the most logical choice. I would be well provided for there.”  
  
“But is it what you want?” Gladio reaches across the table and takes his hand. It’s a gamble. Ignis goes very still, but he doesn’t draw his hand away. “Just think for a minute about where you want to be in ten years. Stop worrying about what you should do or what other people will think. Where do you see yourself?”  
  
Ignis parts his lips, his blind eye lifting to look at the wall above Gladio’s head. “I haven’t thought about it.”  
  
“You must have. C’mon, Ignis, you think about everything.” Gladio squeezes his hand. “Just tell me what you see.”  
  
“Oh, this is ridiculous, but all right.” Ignis sighs, his fingers curling around Gladio’s. Then he closes his eye, his brow creasing, like he’s focusing on a fleeting image in his head. “I see myself waking up in my bed, here in Lestallum. I can feel the sunlight on my face and a warm body wrapped up in the sheets next to me, snoring lightly. It’s early, but I’m in no great hurry to get up.  
  
“We have an automatic coffeemaker, and the aroma of that morning’s brew has already permeated the apartment.” Ignis breathes in, like he can actually smell the beans roasting. “I putter around, listening to the radio as I drink my coffee, before I get dressed for work. I have my own business—perhaps a restaurant. That would be the most realistic option, wouldn’t it? “  
  
Gladio grins. “Yeah, that sounds about right.”  
  
Ignis nods and goes on. “I work hard, but I work the hours I want. I answer to no one but myself. The kitchen is busy, but I’ve always liked it that way. And when I return to my apartment in the evening, I stand in front of the window in my living room, feeling the sun on my face. An arm goes around my waist, holding me against a firm body—my lover, welcoming me home.” He opens his eye again. “Does that satisfy your curiosity?”  
   
“Not quite.” Gladio strokes Ignis’s hand with his thumb. “Who’s your lover?”  
  
“I don’t know. I’ve never…I’ve never imagined a face.”  
  
“Never?”  
  
Ignis lets out a shaky breath. “Gladio, must you ask?”  
  
“I gotta know.” He brings the hand to his lips and presses a soft kiss to Ignis’s knuckles. “Is it me you want, Iggy?” Gently, he turns the hand and kisses the open palm, his heart skipping a beat at Ignis’s sharp intake of breath. “If it is, I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to make you happy. But if it isn’t, I’ll let you go. I swear.”  
  
“Of course it’s you, Gladio. There’s never been another.”  
  
Gladio closes his eyes. Hearing Ignis say it after all these weeks—all these years—feels like a hard-won victory. “Do you have any idea how bad I wanna kiss you right now?”  
  
“Oh, I think I have some idea,” Ignis says.  
  
Gladio lets out a shaky laugh. “What are we gonna do?”  
  
Ignis laughs too. “I don’t know. I suppose we’ll have to decide whether we want to stay in Lestallum or go to Insomnia.”  
  
“I’ll go wherever you go. I mean, if you’ll have me.”  
  
“I’m past the negotiations and second-guessing, Gladio. I want to be with you.” Ignis releases Gladio’s hand and raises his glass. “Now, then. Perhaps a toast is in order? To new beginnings…and a better future.”  
  
Gladio gently clinks his bottle against Ignis’s glass. “I can get behind that.”  
  
They finish their drinks and leave the bar together. Gladio gets the feeling they’re gonna fuck tonight when Ignis takes his hand, twining their fingers together. He knows it for sure when they’re making out against a mailbox, Ignis grabbing handfuls of his hair, before they’ve even made it halfway down the block. Gladio slides his hands between Ignis’s jacket and his shirt, pulling him in close, almost lifting him off the ground.  
  
“You’ll come upstairs, won’t you?” Ignis says when they pause for air. His lips are swollen, his chin red where Gladio’s beard’s been rubbing it. “Please say you will.”  
  
“Yeah.” Gladio smiles into their next kiss. “I’ll come upstairs, Iggy.”

  
*  

  
They’re so tangled in each other’s arms and mouths that they almost fall into the apartment. Ignis trips over the threshold, and only Gladio’s arm around his waist stops him from sprawling onto the floor. It isn’t Gladio’s most graceful entrance into a lover’s apartment. He doesn’t give a fuck, though, because Ignis just laughs against his lips, grabs his ass, and grinds his crotch on Gladio’s thigh. Sweet Shiva, his cock’s already hard, digging into the soft meat that joins Gladio’s groin and leg.  
  
“Gladiolus Amicitia,” Ignis murmurs, “you are wearing entirely too much clothing.”  
  
Gladio grins and presses a kiss to his throat, where his pulse races. “That so?”  
  
He shrugs out of his jacket, and Ignis’s warm, soft palms find their way under his shirt, pushing it up until his fingertips skim over Gladio’s nipples. Ignis chases that touch with his mouth, pulling one of them between his lips and grazing it with his teeth as it hardens. The other, he rolls gently between his thumb and the knuckle of his forefinger. Gladio can’t bite back a groan, his cock going stiff in his pants.  
  
“Help me get this off,” he says, and as he lifts his arms, Ignis pulls the shirt over his head, dropping it on the hallway floor.  
  
They stagger into the kitchen and make out against the counter. Ignis’s hands chart every last inch of Gladio’s torso. Maybe he’s reminding himself what Gladio’s skin feels like. Maybe he’s marking all the differences since the last time they touched. Gladio has his fair share of new scars—dozens of them, too many to count—and Ignis’s fingertips hover over the thick, knotted line of one that crosses his navel.  
  
“What happened?” he asks.  
  
“Yojimbo almost cut me open. Would’ve killed me if Iris hadn’t grabbed my jacket and hauled me back at the last second.”  
  
Ignis walks his fingers upward until they find another one over his solar plexus. “This?” he asks.  
  
“Old Lestallum. Grim reaper’s scythe.”  
  
“And here?” Ignis touches a smooth patch of scar tissue on the right side of his chest, just above his nipple.  
  
“Got a little too close to a bomb.”  
  
Ignis nods, then bends to kiss it, his lips soft and lingering, almost reverent. Astrals fuck him, he’s been an idiot. A complete and total idiot. Ignis isn’t judging him for risking his life a thousand times over. Ignis never tried to stop him from doing what he had to do. They should’ve been fighting side by side all along, but Gladio was too much of an asshole to admit it.  
  
“I’m sorry,” he says.  
  
He buries his fingers in the thick hair at the nape of Ignis’s neck and brings their mouths together again. They cling to each other, tongues warring, as Gladio rocks him up against the counter, his dick looking for friction against Ignis’s hip.  
  
Ignis moans, tilting his head back. “Tell me again.”  
  
“I’m sorry.”  
  
“Not that.” Ignis runs a hand up his arm, thumb stroking the raised vein in Gladio’s bicep. “Tell me what you said that night I had you over for dinner. When we argued.”  
  
Gladio racks his brain. He said a lot of things that night, and he ain’t exactly proud of most of them. He remembers reminiscing about Iris, and demanding Ignis’s forgiveness, and declaring his—  
  
Oh.  
  
_Oh._  
  
“I love you,” he breathes. He grazes his lips over Ignis’s scarred eye, tilting his chin up to plant a soft kiss on his mouth. Words probably aren’t enough to describe this feeling simmering inside him, but he’s gonna try his damnedest. “I love you so much, Iggy.”  
  
Ignis sighs against his lips, like he’s been waiting his whole life to hear Gladio say it. “May I take you?”  
  
Shit. He came here thinking he’d be fucking Ignis, but letting Ignis stick his dick in sounds just as nice. It’s been a long time since they did it that way. There were nights, back in the day, when Ignis was on him as soon as he walked through the door, pushing him down on the bed and kissing him with an uncharacteristic hunger. He remembers how good—how right—Ignis’s cock felt inside him.  
  
It’ll probably feel even better now, after everything they’ve been through to get here.  
  
“Yeah,” he says, laughing. “Yeah, I’d like that.”  
  
Ignis starts to unbutton his shirt. Gladio kisses him again, his thumb stroking the back of his neck, and slips his tongue in when Ignis opens his mouth to him. The way Ignis kisses is more aggressive, more demanding, than it used to be. His teeth nip at Gladio’s lower lip and his tongue fights Gladio’s for control. Gladio lets him have it, sliding his hand up the warm, rippling skin of Ignis’s back as he shrugs out of his shirt.  
  
Once he’s bare from the waist up, Ignis unbuckles his belt and lets his pants drop to the floor. Gladio reaches down and cups him through his boxer briefs. Ignis bucks into his touch, grunting, his dick already rock hard. Gladio traces the ridge of it with his fingertips, stroking a couple of times over the wet spot, and smiles against Ignis’s lips.  
  
“Any chance you can lose the underwear?” he murmurs.  
  
“While you’re still fully clothed?”  
  
Gladio chuckles. “Well, I’m not the one about to get my cock sucked.”  
  
Ignis’s breath catches, but he starts pushing at his underwear, and Gladio takes a step back to look at him as they join his pants on the floor.  
  
Ignis has always had the tight, lithe body of a gymnast. In his years of training and hunting, though, he’s put on some serious muscle. Nowhere near as much as Gladio, but still, he looks bigger. Stronger. Gladio can’t stop staring at the thickness of his thighs, at the bulge of his biceps, at the pecs that twitch when he moves. And just like Gladio, he has new scars, too—a white starburst on his left ankle, and a faded, discoloured line scoring his ribs.  
  
He’s fucking gorgeous, flaws and all.  
  
Falling to his knees, Gladio pushes his thumbs into the meat of Ignis’s thighs to urge his legs apart. His cock’s already dripping with precome. Gladio catches it on his tongue, then teases the head with the tip of it, tracing circles on the hard, flushed skin. Ignis makes a soft sound, hips bucking, and curls his fingers in Gladio’s hair.  
  
Gladio has to laugh at that. For a guy who hasn’t had his dick sucked in years—at least he thinks it’s been years; if Ignis ever met someone new, Iris never mentioned them—Ignis is amazingly restrained.  
  
Gladio takes as much of him as he can into his mouth, relaxing his throat, his nose sinking into the soft down nesting the base of Ignis’s cock. Muscular hamstrings twitch under his hands, and oh, Six, all he can smell is the sharp, familiar musk of Ignis’s balls. It’s making his dick throb in his jeans. He palms himself, letting out a stifled moan, his heart skipping a beat at the sound of Ignis’s breath catching in his throat.  
  
He takes it slow, tasting every inch of Ignis as he glides up and down his shaft. He doesn’t want to make him come. Not yet, anyway. He wants to bring him as close to the brink as he can, as many times as he can, holding Ignis on the edge of orgasm until he’s begging for it.  
  
He draws back until he has the head between his lips, and then he lavishes his attention there, moving his mouth over it once, then again, before sliding all the way back down. Closing his eyes, he builds a lazy rhythm, dragging the flat of his tongue up the sensitive underside of Ignis’s cock as his free hand strokes from the base.  
  
“Oh, Gladio,” Ignis whispers, his fingers following the line of Gladio’s jaw, trailing through his beard. “I’ve missed this.”  
  
Gladio draws off with a slurping sound. “I can do it all night, if you want.”  
  
Ignis lets out a soft laugh, and Gladio turns his head to plant an open-mouthed caress on the inside of Ignis’s thigh. The muscles there tremble under his lips. He nips his way upward, nosing Ignis’s dick aside to kiss his balls, running the pad of his tongue over the tight, furrowed sac. He pulls one nut into his mouth and rolls the other in his hand, taking care to be gentle. Like most guys, Ignis is sensitive here. He needs to keep his touches light.  
  
When Ignis’s grip on his hair tightens, he takes it as his cue that enough’s enough. He brings his lips back to Ignis’s cock. It’s dripping with a fresh string of precome. Gladio swallows him again, swirling his tongue around the head every time he comes up, his fingers digging into the crack of Ignis’s ass for purchase. He can tell, by the shallow way Ignis is breathing and the helpless quiver in his thighs, that he’s going to come soon.  
  
So he releases his dick from his mouth with a pop and rises to kiss him, letting Ignis taste himself on Gladio’s tongue.  
  
“Where do you want to do this?” he asks.  
  
“The couch,” Ignis says. He’s already pawing at Gladio’s belt, pulling the tongue from the buckle. “It’s closer than the bed.”  
  
Gladio nods, reaching into his back pocket to grab his wallet before Ignis rips the rest of his clothes off. He opens it and slips out the condom he always keeps there—just in case—then tosses the wallet on the kitchen counter.  
  
Tugging at his pants, Ignis starts to walk him backward, into the living area just off the kitchen. Gladio catches himself on the doorframe, holding onto it so he doesn’t trip over his pants as he steps out of them. Once he’s free of them, Ignis slips a hand into his underwear, running his palm over Gladio’s dick. Gladio’s eyes slide shut and his hips jerk into that touch.  
  
“Dunno if I’m gonna make it to the couch at this rate,” he teases, catching Ignis’s lips in another kiss.  
  
“I suppose we could always do it on the table,” Ignis says.  
  
Gladio looks at it, the huge mahogany thing that Ignis brought into the apartment after he left. They ate dinner here only a week ago. Fucking on it seems wrong.  
  
But also kind of right.  
  
“Yeah,” he says, letting Ignis tug his underwear down his thighs. “I guess we could.”  
  
This time, when Ignis kisses him, his cock slides between Gladio’s legs, soft as silk where it rubs against his inner thighs. Gladio puts his arms around Ignis and draws him close. Being with Liv made him forget how good it feels to hold hard muscle encased in warm skin, to run his hand over a firm ass dusted with hair. He grazes his lips over the stubble on Ignis’s jaw, buries his face in Ignis’s neck, breathing in the warm, woody smell of his aftershave.  
  
With a contented sigh, he says, “We could just cuddle, too.”  
  
Ignis squeezes his ass cheek in warning. “I think not.”  
  
Gladio laughs and tears open the foil package he’s holding, moving to roll the condom onto Ignis’s dick. But Ignis places a hand on his to stop him.  
  
“If it’s all right with you, I’d rather not use that,” he says.  
  
Gladio licks his lips, his mouth suddenly dry. They’ve never had sex without a condom before. The thought of doing it skin on skin, without a barrier between them, makes his heart hammer like it’s trying to bust out of his ribcage. “You sure?”  
  
Ignis nods. “I’ve only been with one other person since you. And I trust you’re clean?”  
  
“Yeah.” Besides Liv, he’s had nothing but his own right hand. Then he frowns as Ignis’s words register. Here he was, like an idiot, thinking Ignis was celibate all these years. “Wait, who’s this other person?”  
  
Ignis places his fingertips on Gladio’s lips to hush him. “I don’t kiss and tell, Gladio.”  
  
“Fair enough.” It ain’t his business, after all, and he’s not sure he really wants to know. “You got lube somewhere?”  
  
Ignis nods. “In the drawer beside my bed. The room we shared, before we…”  
  
“Yeah.” Gladio kisses him. He doesn’t want to bring up bad memories, not now, when they’re trying to make good ones. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”  
  
The only thing that’s changed in the years since Gladio left is that Ignis now has a bed frame for the mattress they used to sleep on. Besides that, the room is sparsely furnished. Probably easier for Ignis to get around that way, without his eyes. There’s just an armoire and a bedside table with a lamp on it. Gladio kneels next to it and opens the drawer, finding a bottle of lube and a dusty paperback romance.  
  
Gladio grabs the lube and goes back to Ignis. He announces his presence with another kiss and a gentle hand on Ignis’s hip.  
  
“This stuff ain’t expired, is it?” he asks.  
  
Ignis shakes his head. “I haven’t had many partners, but I’ve been…well, I’ve been active all the same.”  
  
Shiva’s tits. The thought of Ignis lying in bed, thrusting his cock into his own lube-oiled fist, sends the rest of the blood in his body rushing south.  
  
He flicks open the cap and squeezes some into his hand, smearing it over his fingers to warm it up. Then he starts to slick it onto Ignis’s dick. At his touch, Ignis lets out a grunt. And damn, if he doesn’t look good when he’s being pleasured. The muscles in his face loosen and his lips part as his breathing stutters. One of his hands comes up to brace himself on Gladio’s shoulder, his palm warm and damp with sweat. Gladio would gladly watch him like this all day.  
  
Problem is, he doesn’t think he could hold on that long himself.  
  
He starts to work Ignis slowly, brushing his thumb across the head with every stroke. It’s beading with precome again. Gladio glances down at it, watching the fluid leak out, and his own dick aches with need. He wants to pour everything he feels for Ignis into the motion of his hand. He wants Ignis to know that, for him, this is more than just sex. It’s love and need and desire. He doesn’t just want Ignis to fuck him. He wants Ignis to own him, to claim him.  
  
He grasps Ignis’s ass with his free hand, pulling him closer as his thumb grazes the sensitive spot just under the head of his cock. “Gonna give it to me hard?”  
  
Ignis sucks in a shallow breath through parted lips. His clouded eye opens, gazing heavy-lidded over Gladio’s shoulder. “Is that what you want?”  
  
“Yeah.” Though honestly, he doesn’t care how Ignis does it, as long as he gets to feel that cock inside him. He’s wanted this for so gods-damned long. “Want you to fuck me so hard we break the table.”  
  
“That could take some doing. It’s hewn from the finest—”  
  
Gladio shuts him up with a kiss. Ignis opens his mouth to him, letting out a soft moan when Gladio adjusts his grip on his cock. He’s stroking too slowly to bring Ignis anywhere near orgasm, and Ignis asks for more with the shallow thrusting of his hips, the muscles of his ass cheek clenching and unclenching under Gladio’s hand.  
  
“We can talk about the craftsmanship of your table later,” Gladio says, breathing hard, when they break apart. He takes Ignis’s hand and squeezes lube into it. “I need you to fuck me now.”  
  
Ignis pushes him down until he’s lying flat on his back with his ass at the edge of the table. Gladio holds himself open with his hands behind his knees, watching Ignis as he steps between Gladio’s legs. It takes him a minute to find Gladio’s hole. He trails lube-slicked fingers down Gladio’s hamstring, across his ass cheek, until they brush against the ring of muscle. Gladio exhales at his touch.  
  
“May I…?” Ignis asks.  
  
“Yeah,” Gladio groans, dropping his head back against the table with a heavy thunk, “fuck, yeah.”  
  
One finger slips inside him, just like that. Easy, even though it’s been years since the last time Ignis did this to him. And then that finger finds his prostate so fast, it’s like it’s equipped with a fucking homing beacon, pulling an unbidden groan out of him. Over the years, he forgot how good a finger up his ass could be. Liv never did this to him. He never asked her to. He never thought to ask.  
  
This was always something he did with Ignis.  
  
The pleasure is so intense, blooming deep inside him, that the pain when Ignis adds a second finger is a little easier to take. Those fingers work Gladio open, unrelenting but always gentle, teasing at his prostate, and by the time Ignis gets a third one in there, Gladio’s more than ready for his cock.  
  
“Iggy—” He breaks off into a moan when Ignis massages his prostate again. “—You gonna make me beg you for it?”  
  
“Well, I wouldn’t be opposed to that,” Ignis teases, but he withdraws his fingers anyway.  
  
He slicks his dick with a little more lube and lines himself up between Gladio’s legs. The head of his cock bumps against Gladio’s hole. Biting his lip, Gladio pulls his balls back and lifts his head to watch as Ignis pushes it into him. The sight of it—fuck, the _fullness_ of it—sends goosebumps racing up his arms and back. Ignis does it slowly, like he’s savouring the way Gladio’s body engulfs him inch by inch. His eye drifts closed and his brow creases, his slippery hand scrabbling for purchase on Gladio’s knee.  
  
“Oh, gods, Iggy,” Gladio breathes, letting his head fall back against the table. His body isn’t used to being opened up like this, not anymore. As good as it feels, it hurts a little, too. And maybe that’s what’s so exciting about it—that it’s new all over again. This Ignis isn’t the same one he fucked six years ago. This Ignis knows what he wants, and he has Gladio at his mercy.  
  
Once Ignis is all the way in, he holds himself there, trembling, his hand moving to Gladio’s inner thigh to keep his legs apart. “Are you all right?”  
  
Gladio swallows, nodding. “Yeah. You?”  
  
“Quite.” Ignis draws back out, as slow as he went in, before he snaps his hips forward, driving himself deep inside of Gladio. The force of it punches a gasp out of Gladio’s lungs. “You’ll let me know if I’m hurting you?”  
  
“‘Course.”  
  
Smiling, Ignis leans over to kiss his bent knee. “Thank you.”  
  
And then he fucks Gladio like he’s unleashing six years of pent-up lust.  
  
Gladio grunts, gripping the edge of the table to ground himself, as Ignis sets a punishing pace. Every thrust shoves him up the table, but the hands on his hips pull him back, holding him in place. His ass is gonna be sore tomorrow.  
  
Fuck it, though.  
  
Watching Ignis enjoy the hell out of his body is worth it. As much as he wants to close his eyes and lose himself in the sensation of Ignis nailing him, he can’t look away. Heavy-lidded, Ignis gazes down at him, almost like he can see Gladio lying there. His chest and abs and biceps glisten with sweat, the creases in his forehead deepening as he chases his orgasm.  
  
Ignis leans his shoulder into Gladio’s leg, pushing it back, spreading Gladio open. At this angle, his dick strokes up against Gladio’s prostate with every thrust. It feels fucking incredible, like he’s been riding the edge of his release for the past ten minutes, and Gladio hasn’t even touched his own cock yet.  
  
Shuddering, he runs his palm up and down it, the calluses grazing the sensitive nerves along the underside. A part of him wishes Ignis could see him like this—spread out under him, flushed and sweaty, taking his cock like a fucking porn star. But maybe it doesn't matter that Ignis can’t see any of it. Maybe imagining it is good enough. With that tantalizing thought, Gladio rubs a thumb over the head of his dick, lubing his hand with precome before he starts to stroke himself, building up speed until he’s keeping pace with Ignis’s thrusts.  
  
“Fuck, you feel good,” he pants over the wet slicking of his foreskin and the slap of Ignis’s balls against his ass.  
  
Ignis answers with a moan and a particularly deep, uncontrolled thrust. When he finds his pace again, it’s with renewed vigour, his hips slapping against Gladio’s ass with a desperate speed. Gladio can tell he’s going to come soon. It’s been a long time since they fucked, but Gladio remembers the signs. He’s got his head tilted back, his chest rising and falling with quick, shallow breaths. Gladio hooks his free leg around Ignis’s waist and urges him deeper, his hand jerking his cock.  
  
It only takes a few more thrusts before Gladio’s orgasm hits him. He cries out, his body shuddering helplessly as white-hot pleasure overtakes him, and his cock shoots warm, pulsing ropes of come up his chest. He works himself through it, the muscles of his ass clenching around Ignis’s dick. That’s all it takes to bring Ignis with him. He makes a sound like something halfway between a sob and a gasp, his hips pumping weakly once, twice, three more times against him, until he topples, spent, across Gladio’s chest.  
  
In the silence, Gladio buries his fingers in Ignis’s sweat-soaked hair and lets his head fall back against the table. He doesn’t think he could move if he tried. Every muscle in his body aches, and feeling Ignis’s sticky skin against his own has brought back so much of the closeness they lost all those years ago. He wants to hold Ignis just like this forever.  
  
“You okay?” he asks, letting his hand slip down to rub Ignis’s back.  
  
Ignis nods, turning his head to kiss Gladio’s chest. “None the worse for wear.”  
  
He starts to withdraw his cock, and Gladio winces as he feels spend ooze out of his ass along with it. It’s messy, but it’s also hot as hell, knowing Ignis was inside him without a condom. For a few minutes, they were as close as two people could be—and if he has anything to say about it, it won’t be the last time.  
  
He accepts Ignis’s hand when it’s offered and lets himself be pulled upright. A glance at the table tells him it’s going to need a real good cleaning before they can even think about eating at it again. There are spots of moisture where his sweaty skin had a lain, and a milky pool of come on the polished mahogany surface. He can feel it trickling down the inside of his thighs.  
  
“Gladio.” Ignis tugs on his hand, turning him until their lips meet. It’s a sweet kiss, slow and sated, his fingers trailing over the come drying on Gladio’s belly. “You’ll stay the night, won’t you?”  
  
Gladio smiles, brushing Ignis’s sweaty hair back off his forehead. “Yeah. You know I will.”

  
*

  
Later, Gladio stands at the sink, flossing his teeth, and looks at Ignis’s things laid out on the counter. His razor and pine-scented aftershave, in the top left-hand corner. His toothbrush and toothpaste, in the top right. A bar of lemongrass soap next to the knob marked HOT. Nothing has changed. Everything is exactly the same as it was when Gladio lived here. It’s almost like he never left.  
  
But he’s also missed so much.  
  
How many mornings did he waste waking up next to someone he didn’t love? How many nights, fucking someone who didn’t heat his blood?  
  
It’s all the time he can’t get back that hurts the most.  
  
He pads into the bedroom and finds Ignis already lying under the blankets, his hands folded over his belly. His turns his head when he hears Gladio enter the room, but like always, his eye never quite finds him.  
  
Gladio kicks off his boxers and climbs in next to him. The sheets are cool, but Iggy’s body is warm when he moves into Gladio’s arms and kisses him again, urgently, as if he’s trying to make up for all the time they wasted. Gladio slips a hand down the back of his pyjama pants and cups his ass, twining their legs together.  
  
“Gods, I missed you,” he murmurs.  
  
Ignis brushes Gladio’s nose with his own, speaks against his lips. “Do you remember when I told you I didn’t lie awake thinking about you?”  
  
Gladio snorts. “How could I forget?”  
  
“It wasn’t true. I thought about you every day. I never stopped hoping you’d come home.”  
  
“I should’ve.” Gladio closes his eyes, turning his face into the pillow. “I’m an idiot.”  
  
Ignis presses another soft kiss to his mouth. “Hush. We’re together now.”  
  
Gladio nods. There’s no use dwelling on all his fuck-ups, or the hundreds of nights he didn’t get to spend with Ignis. They’re in each other’s arms tonight, and that’s all that matters.  
  
In the lamplight, Gladio studies his face, his eyes mapping the high cheekbones, the full curve of his bottom lip, the freckles that pepper his cheeks and nose and chin. His hair lies across his forehead, hiding his scarred eyebrow. He’s been through hell and back, but he’s still young and beautiful. The most beautiful fucking thing Gladio’s ever seen.  
  
“Hey,” he murmurs, pulling Ignis closer with the hand on his ass. He wants to feel Ignis inside him one more time before he goes to sleep. Just in case he wakes in the morning to find it was all a dream. “You ready to go again?”  
  
Lips parting, Ignis nods. Gladio pulls down Ignis’s pyjama pants just enough to free his cock. He strokes it a few times, hand wet with lube, to get him fully hard. Then he rolls onto his side, and Ignis takes him from behind, making love to him with unhurried thrusts, his breath shuddering against the back of Gladio’s neck. He splays a hand over Gladio’s belly, and Gladio covers it with his own, eventually guiding it down to stroke his cock. It’s a gradual, torturous climb to orgasm, a pleasure that builds over what feels like hours.  
  
When Gladio finally comes, it’s like letting go of the ledge he’s been clinging to for dear life.  
  
Only instead of oblivion, Ignis holds him as he falls.  


  
*

  
He wakes in the night to the sound of choked sobs.  
  
For one groggy, confused minute, he thinks it’s something he’s done. Shit, maybe Ignis regrets sleeping with him. Maybe Ignis wants him to leave. No. No, that can’t be it. They fucked twice, and if Ignis didn’t like it after all, he damn well wouldn’t cry about it. He’d kick Gladio out on his ass.  
  
Anxious, he sits up, fumbling for the chain on the light beside the bed, and Ignis goes quiet next to him.  
  
“Iggy?” he asks. He finds the chain and tugs it, flooding the bed with buttery light. Ignis lies with his back to Gladio, his broad shoulders shaking. Gently, Gladio touches his arm. “You okay? What’s wrong?”  
  
Ignis breathes in, shuddering, like he’s trying to get control of himself. From where he’s sitting, Gladio can see the wetness on his cheek. He sighs and scoots closer to him.  
  
“I got you,” Gladio says. He settles down on the pillow next to Ignis and puts his arm around him, pulling him against Gladio’s chest. “I got you. Talk to me.”  
  
Ignis shakes his head. “I can’t even look at a photograph of him.”  
  
Oh.  
  
Fuck.  
  
“Noct?” he asks.  
  
Ignis nods. His heart aching, Gladio covers his hand with his own where it’s curled up under his chin. If only there was something he could say or do to make it better. Besides Regis, no one loved Noct like Ignis did. Hell, had it been an option, Ignis probably would’ve crawled into the grave in Noct’s place.  
  
He rests his forehead between Ignis’s shoulder blades, closing his eyes. “It’ll get better, I promise. You just have to give it time.”  
  
“Do you think he knew?”  
  
_Knew we would have pulled down the sky to save him._  
  
_Knew how much it hurt to say goodbye._  
  
_Knew we loved him more than anything._  
  
All the words they didn’t know how to say when Noct told them he had to go.  
  
“He knew,” Gladio murmurs, tears pricking his own eyes. He presses a kiss to Ignis’s neck, to his shoulder, to the hand clasped in his own. There isn’t much he can say to take the pain away, but he can tell this truth, at least. “Gods, Iggy, he knew. And he loved us too.”

  
*

  
The next day, when they’ve cleared away the remains of their breakfast and they’re enjoying the morning over piping cups of coffee, they dial Cor and put him on speakerphone.  
  
“You two made your decision yet?” he asks, when they tell him they’re both on the call.  
  
“Yeah.” Gladio glances at Ignis and takes his hand where it lies on the tabletop, squeezing it reassuringly. They’re making a huge decision here, taking a gamble on the future. Gladio hopes Ignis won’t regret it. “Thanks for making the offer, but we’re gonna stay in Lestallum.”  
  
“Are you sure about this?”  
  
“Positive,” Ignis says.  
  
“Until now, we’ve been living our lives for other people,” Gladio says. “We’ve sacrificed a lot. Hell, maybe we’re being selfish, but we wanna live for ourselves for a while.”  
  
Cor sighs. “Well, I can’t fault you for that. I’m surprised by you, Ignis. I thought you’d accept for sure.”  
  
“If I may, Marshal,” Ignis says. “I’d be happy to consult for you on a part-time basis, if you wish it. I don’t need to be in Insomnia to dispense my knowledge, do I?”  
  
At that, Cor actually laughs. “No, I guess you don’t.”  
  
“Then it’s settled,” Ignis says. He turns his head in Gladio’s direction and smiles. “I’ll be in touch next week to discuss my rates. Until then, take care, Marshal.”  
  
Gladio hangs up, feeling weirdly giddy, like they’ve just gotten away with something. And maybe they have. Growing up, his dad always taught him that duty was everything—that Gladio could never have what he really wanted, because he was destined for something greater, even if something greater involved standing between death and his king. Even if it meant giving up his life.  
  
His dad would probably tell him not to turn his back on Lucis.  
  
But his dad ain’t here.  
  
And if he feels any guilt over his decision, he forgets it as soon as he looks at Ignis, smiling at him in the sunlight. They’ve done enough for Lucis. After everything they’ve been through, don’t they deserve to be happy?  
  
Gladio washes up their plates as Ignis tunes the radio to the morning news. The announcer reports on the masses that have begun to return to Insomnia, and on Cor’s ongoing talks with the government of Accordo. Someone’s launching a new festival in Lestallum to celebrate the sun’s return. Boots, the mayor’s cat, has found its way back home after a perilous three days on the lam. Then the reports give way to classic rock. He can hear Ignis humming along to the song in the other room, his voice sweet and thin.  
  
Smiling, Gladio dries the dishes and stacks them in the cupboard, then wipes down the counter with a dishtowel. When he enters the living room, he finds Ignis standing at the window, bathed in the daylight that blazes through the glass. The sun’s rays turn his hair a burnished gold. Ignis can’t see the view of Lestallum Main spread out below them, or the yawning infinity of Taelpar Crag beyond it, but he can probably feel the warmth of the sun on his upturned face.  
  
Gladio steps up behind him and winds an arm around his waist, resting his chin on his shoulder. “Hey. What are you thinking about?”  
  
Ignis laughs softly, placing his hand on Gladio’s forearm. “You. Us. The future.”  
  
“You’re not worried, are you?” Gladio asks.  
  
“No. I’m just reminded of a time you held me like this, only we were out in the darkness, and it seemed the light would never come.” Ignis sighs and leans back into his embrace. “Still, when I was in your arms, I didn’t fear the daemons. I didn’t fear the night. I felt safe. And I knew there would be better days ahead of us.”  
  
Gladio nods, pressing his face into Ignis’s hair. He remembers it, too—the night they slept together for the first time, wanting comfort from each other’s bodies, but neither knowing they’d end up here. “You were right.”  
  
“I was.”  
  
Ignis turns in his arms, tilting his face up to claim Gladio’s lips. They kiss in a pool of sunlight, Ignis’s hands sliding up the back of his shirt, his mouth opening to let Gladio in. It’s perfect. It’s everything Gladio needs. It’s all he’s wanted, these past six years.  
  
Ignis draws back a little, smiling against Gladio’s lips. “I have something else to tell you.”  
  
“What?” he asks.  
  
“There are even better days than these yet to come,” he answers, and pulls Gladio down to kiss him again.  


**Author's Note:**

> This project took everything out of me, and I have so many people to thank for helping to drag me past the finish line.
> 
> First, I want to thank HorologiumParadox for taking on the monumental task of beta reading this story. You caught so many things that slipped past me on my countless re-reads. You rock, Horo! <3
> 
> Next, I want to give a shoutout to the members of Chill XV, who had to listen to me whine and cry and bellyache non-stop about how hard it was to write this. Atropa, Swordy, Banj, Becks, Kura, Pen, Raine, Muse, Fay, Ginia, Way, Love, and Yune, I sincerely could not have completed this without your support. Thanks for picking me up when I was down. I love you guys. <3
> 
> Last, I want to thank everyone who's still with me on this journey. Your kudos and comments make me feel like my writing is worth reading. This story is far from the last in the Lights of Lestallum journey, but it's an important pit-stop along the way.
> 
> As usual, if you enjoyed this, please consider kudosing and/or commenting! They sustain me. They really do. Thank you!


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